Tales From the Third Lobe - This time the woodshed visits you

About the author: Descended from old English money, Vidicon was raised by spiny echidnas in the mountainous rainforests of the North American Southeast. Lured back to society by time-traveling gray/reptiloid alien hybrids posing as renegade Jesuits, he has managed to maintain his outsider's perspective and an appetite for crunchy insects. Today, Vidicon is a world-class synchronicity surfer and an unlicensed quantum mechanic. He has a fourth-degree black belt in weird. About his bi-weekly column: Tales from the Third Lobe are the unfocused meanderings of the World's Smartest Moron. Topics range widely over the sciences, religion, philosophy, technology, modern culture, mysticism, Vidicon's personal history and viewpoints, and whatever pissed him off in the media last week. View all articles by Laszlo Q. V. St-J. "Vidicon" Xalieri, 2HC Columnist...

This was originally an internal memo for the staff here at 2HC, broadcast on our private mailing list. I've been encouraged to run it as my article for this issue.

I was going to polish all the 2HC-specific bits off of it and leave just the parts that might be relevant to the volunteers and/or working stiffs in general, but it occurs to me that that would be insulting my readers' intelligence. If you are here, you can generalize for yourself. Taking it out of its native context blunts the edge and hides the reason I wrote this, and that's not what we're about here.

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Sure, you can't expect to be picked up by the talent scouts if you play in a really lousy band. But if you perform like you don't care because you play in a really lousy band and what's the point, then the scouts who do wander past will certainly pass you over. And. You will never inspire your mates to play any better.

In my band? Some of the folks care more than others about us looking good and performing well, both individually and as a band, as their values and priorities and available time drive them. I can't play at my peak 24/7 either. Whatever. We all are in the same situation. But all of us have the potential. Except the ones that decide that they don't or stop performing altogether.

Having said that, 2HC is not a really lousy band. In fact, while it's not world-class yet, it's quite a bit better than merely mediocre. Which is why, in my separate peer-to-peer, writer-to-writer, not-speaking-for-the-administration diatribe on professionalism (which, by the way, in the minds of most professionals, does not include posting your "I quit, motherfuckers!" memo to the Internet) I mentioned that we obviously had something special going for us or we would not have had so many years of staying power in such a volatile environment. The house we're building stands up to the weather just fine.

Every one of us is in the same situation. Every one of us is a volunteer, including the site owner/editor-in-chief. There are no subscription fees and there are no ads, and, yeah, the merchandising is a joke. But that's the point. 2HC isn't in it for other people's money—because anyone who gives us money can and will attempt to control the content, and the 2HC charter says we will accept no external strings. The few bucks that show up from merchandise sales go to offset a little of the hosting fees and the recent software upgrade to the content management system, for which Pulse is contributing, voluntarily, out of pocket. And he is not what I would call a wealthy man. Even so, any cash left over would come to us.

In addition to offering editing and coaching for a dozen columns (supposedly written by people who are selected to be largely capable of managing themselves and editing their own crap so as to keep his workload down), Pulse does the weekly updates and post-update corrections and whatever marketing takes place and writes his own damn column and writes a slew of other stuff for the site and for elsewhere and has a day-job and a home and a family and a life. Pulse is fully half of 2HC, leaving the other half to be divided twelve ways by the other authors, who contribute a mere 1,000 words every two weeks. In their spare time.

And we want him to do more work? And PAY the dozen of us as well? Merely because we can excrete a kiloword of clever phrasings a couple dozen times per year?

McSweeney's, whose name has been taken in vain several times in the past week or two, doesn't pay dick. Not a penny. Not even to established world-class authors. Send your shit there if you prefer. I send Eggers stuff. Too. And I even pay money to send stories to Glimmer Train. And a few other places. Because writing as a business requires a large investment of time and effort and sometimes even cash, not just clever words in discreet clumps. In fact, if you're good at the business, you can probably get away with writing total crap. If you want money, you concentrate on working, not on writing. Someone will eventually slip up and print your crap and maybe even pay you for it. If you push it. But if you don't push it? Nothing happens.

You want the site you write for to be successful enough to sell subscriptions and action figures? Volunteer to help with the marketing, which, I might add, does not include posting "The site I write for sucks so I don't know why I bother to write for it or you bother to read it" to our current and potential readers on the Internet. Review the work of your co-authors and offer feedback and critique. Design better graphics and slogans to put on the t-shirts. And wear one. Put the bumper sticker on your car. Start conversations with your co-volunteers to see how they can all work together to address the rough spots. Contribute money to cover overhead costs for improvements. Contribute pieces worthy of being put in your portfolio to try to impress future employers. Settle issues with coworkers in private instead of in public (or, worse yet, behind their backs with a gossiping crew that you can count on to throw gasoline on the fire). Cultivate non-antagonistic relationships with your mates so you can settle differences and disagreements without anger and bloodshed.

Would you volunteer for Habitat for Humanity and build a crappy house? Would you bang the nails in any old way and say, "What does it matter? I'm not getting paid, and besides, no one is standing over my shoulder to check my work. Everyone else here is an amateur too. I have no respect for anyone who works here--largely because, regardless of their skills and talents, they work here. In fact, I'd never live in a house built like this by people like me. The people who will live here will have to be forced to move in at gunpoint. It'll never stand up to a high wind. This construction job will look really sucky on my resume. Why the hell am I even here? How does this help me at all?"

If that's your attitude, go home, and to hell with you. If there are parts of your job you can't do—either don't know how or don't have the time for or just find too fucking distasteful—then raise your hand and ask for help and/or slack. And likely you'll get it because, hey, every contribution, as long as it is a worthwhile contribution, helps.

Or you could bow out gracefully. Apologize for not understanding the duties required additional to just writing, for biting off more than you can chew and wasting our time. Or maybe you just changed your mind about whether the work was what you wanted to do with your time. Whatever. Nothing lasts forever.

But if you kick the house on your way out, expect everyone working in there to put down their hammers and saws and levels and brushes and come out and justifiably beat the shit out of you, taking, in the name of loyalty and camaraderie, whatever bruises we'll probably get from you in exchange. Because the job requires that of us, too.

And when you limp off we'll pick up our tools and repair your damage and get back to fucking work. And afterwards we'll have a beer.

But we'll all remember forever what an asshole you were. This industry is not as large as you think. Wherever you go you'll be working with one of us somewhere. But possibly not if they ask our opinion first.

Or maybe they'll just do a Google search and see how you handle conflicts with managers and coworkers. You think someone will hire you when they can expect to have you shit on them on the Internet if you get unhappy? The Internet is forever. Memories are forever. If you later patch things up, no one will pull your "blowing off steam" diatribe out of the Google caches for you, or out of observers' heads. You have to apologize three times as loud as you scream when you curse. And if you're the type that will broadcast those curses? Nobody wants to hold a hot potato. Or a time bomb.

You can say none of this really counts because you aren't getting paid, but you know that's not true. Because "not getting paid" is exactly the same psychologically as "not getting paid enough" and nobody gets paid enough. That's what economy means.

You'll act like you act wherever you go unless your future employer can make you love them, and that's too much goddamn work to ask from anyone who isn't asking you to marry them.

Mend your fucking ways.

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